Friday, May 14, 2010

The tragically pathetic David Swanson

D-LISTER GOSSIP DAVID SWANSON HELD A PRESS CONFERENCE AT THE MONO LOCO IN CHARLOTTESVILLE, VA. LATE THIS AFTERNOON. POST-LUNCH CROWD SO THE PLACE WAS DESERTED ALLOWING THESE REPORTERS TO NOTICE THE ROASTED TOMATO VINAGRETTE RUNNING DOWN SWANSON'S PLUS-SIZE T-SHIRT.

Obama should be in prison.As should anyone who votes for anyone who funds illegal wars.The two parties should be eliminated.Try to read it a few times to find the Democratic conspiracy hidden deep within.f you can't find it, try suspecting it isn't there.Then read books, including mine, which will help prevent future paranoia at least about me.

AT THE END OF HIS BITCHY AND SELF-RIGHTEOUS STATEMENT, THE ROOM ERUPTED IN LAUGHTER ("THE ROOM" WAS THESE REPORTERS AND THE WAIT STAFF).

A RED FACED SWANSON BEGAN HISSING ABOUT HOW "THAT WOMAN" GOT HIM WRONG AND HE WAS VERY STRONG AND HE STOOD UP AND TOLD THE TRUTH ABOUT BARRY O AND HE NEVER BACKED DOWN "NEVER! NEVER!"

The first thing I did was use a reckless headline. I titled an article "Obama Scraps Iraq Withdrawal." Maybe I wanted people to read it. Maybe I was used to the overwhelming indifference to articles about Afghanistan and didn't realize that Iraq was still a hot topic. Maybe I'd grown used to people accepting imprecise headlines when they were about Bush. Primarily, however, I recklessly picked a headline related to stories I linked to in my first paragraph in order to write on a related theme. In any case, I got literally hundreds of angry complaints, all of which were correct. Obama has not announced that there will never be any withdrawal from Iraq.

THAT WOULD BE THE CRAVEN, COWARDLY ACTIONS THAT C.I. WAS RIGHTLY CALLING OUT. SWANSON RUSHED OVER TO THESE REPORTERS AND INSISTED THAT WE INFLATE THE "CROWD" THAT TURNED OUT FOR HIS PRESS CONFERENCE. WE BEGGED OFF EXPLAINING THAT WE'D LEAVE IT UP TO HIM SINCE HE WAS SO MUCH BETTER AT LYING THAN ANYONE WE'D EVER MET.

PLUS, WE ADDED, WE WERE THERE TO SAMPLE THE COCONUT CRUSTED SALMON AND WEREN'T EVEN AWARE OF HIS PRESS CONFERENCE UNTIL WE ARRIVED. (HECK, WE WERE BARELY AWARE OF HIM.)

Paul Jay: We are talking to Josh Stieber. He was a member of the army company in Baghdad that day that everyone has now seen. This is the video where Apache helicopters attacks a group of Iraqis on the ground. Josh was a member of that company. Not there that day. But now we're talking about how Josh came from joining the army to, a couple of years later, applying for conscientious objector status. Thanks again for joining us, Josh.

Josh Stieber: Sure. Thanks for having me.

Paul Jay: So let's just pick up the story where we left off. So you've more or less finished boot camp, what comes next?

Josh Stieber: A couple of more months training with the company I eventually deployed with.

Paul Jay: And in terms of this arc of how you get from joining to conscientious objector status. What took place before you go to Iraq? Is there another kind of moment there for you?

Josh Stieber: I guess another big moment in training that really started making me ask questions -- and a good excuse not to ask too many -- but what initially disturbed me was our leaders would take us to us into a room one at a time, take the new soldiers, and they would ask us a series of questions leading up to this big question that if somebody were to pull a weapon in a marketplace full of completely unarmed civilians and there was only one person with a weapon, would you return fire towards that person? And not only did you have to say "yes" but in this exercise if you even hesitated in your answer then you got yelled out for not being a good soldier and not being prepared to do what it took to keep your fellow soldiers safe?

Paul Jay: So when they asked you, what did you say? Did you hesitate?

Josh Stieber: I hesistated. And after a second or two, they really ripped into me.

Paul Jay: Saying what?

Josh Stieber: Again, I needed to be prepared to fire whenever I was told and I had to keep it -- always be aware of these threats and any hesitation could potentially mean the lives of the other soldiers.

Paul Jay: So the idea of killing women and children is an actual part of the training that you have to internalize that this is acceptable under the right circumstances?

Josh Stieber: Yeah, it's not specifically said that we're going to go out today and kill women and children but if it should happen in the process of doing what we're supposed to --

Paul Jay: But when you put that with what you told us in the first segment of the interview that one of the marching chants was killing women and spewing bullets on children, it seems to be something they know you're going to get into -- these situations with civilians -- and so part of the training is accepting the killing of civilians as part of your job.

Josh Stieber: Yeah, again, it's all very psychological. And I even take that beyond just military training and say there's aspects of our society -- going back and looking at my history class, when I learned about the atomic bombings or bombings in other wars that either intentionally targeted civilians or there were a lot of civilian casualties in the process. Just that same mindset: "This was unfortunate, we don't intentionally do this most of the time but if it should so happen that it happens as we're accomplishing our greater goals, then so be it.

We'll try to note more from the multi-part interview. The plan was to pair the above with something a friend wanted to noted. Can't note the latter. Radio program. Not in the mood for uninformed hosts. Don't talk about past war coverage by broadcast networks if you don't know what you're talking about. I don't care if says a kernal of truth somewhere in that nonsense. He's uneducated and he doesn't know what he's talking about. During Vietnam, you had reporters who were not embedded. The moron seems to believe that the only way reporters have ever covered a war is by being embedded. I'm not noting his program. We'll instead move over to US Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi.

US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi: I was just in Iraq last week to visit the troops, in preparation for Memorial Day, to see them and they're so great. There's nothing that's happening there that-that would justify continuation of the policy. In order to bring stability to the region, more security to the American people and restore our reputation, we must redeploy those troops out of Iraq safely, honorably, responsibly and soon. We've lost -- what is it, 4075 -- something like that now. Every one of them precious to us. Tens of thousands wounded, many of them permanently. And I was just at the hospital -- and I'll go to the VA hospital again after I leave here. The loss of repuation in the world. The cost in dollars to our -- taking us into debt, into recession, into a-a -- where the relationship between the war and the economy are becoming more apparent. And if you didn't care about -- well I'm sure you care about all of that -- but if you're just thinking militarily, the undermining of our capability to protect the American people, undermining our military strength is staggering. We don't have one combat ready unit in the United States to go to protect our interests where ever they are threatened or those of our friends. So it has to end. And soon. We just passed another bill. The House keeps passing with deadlines or to accomodate the Senate's sometimes goals We just sent them another one. They sent it back without-without the redeployment language. We'll send something back to them. But it is essential and it will happen. And it will happen, in my view, with a Democratic president and that will begin in a matter of months and that is the optimism that I --

San Francisco Chronicle: Why not put withdrawal dates in this bill to the Senate and stand up to them and just say, "It's got to be this way, we're not going to give in"?

US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi: Well they -- See there is a bipartisan majority for that in the Senate -- Democrats and Republicans alike -- but there aren't sixty votes. So nothing would ever get to the president's desk. And there just isn't a -- That just won't happen.

Barack Obama allowed the left to believe he was one of them. Some of his campaign promises certainly fed its hopes: He'd close Guantanamo, pass union "card check," renegotiate Nafta, leave Iraq. Adding to the left's exuberance was the party's filibuster-proof Senate majority.But Guantanamo is still open, card check is still dead, Nafta is still functioning, and troops remain in Iraq.

Yesterday's snapshot noted Martin Chulov (Guardian) reporting, "The White House is likely to delay the withdrawal of the first large phase of combat troops from Iraq for at least a month after escalating bloodshed and political instability in the country." Today on Democracy Now!, Amy Goodman explained, "The Guardian newspaper reports the White House is likely to delay the withdrawal of the first large phase of combat troops from Iraq for at least a month after escalating bloodshed and political instability in the country. The US commander, General Ray Odierno, had originally expected to give the order within sixty days of the general election held in Iraq on March 7. In a message to Congress yesterday, President Obama said the situation in Iraq continues to pose an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States." David Martin (CBS News) notes the talk of the pace of the drawdown and provides this walk through, "There are currently 94,000 U.S. troops in Iraq, meaning Odierno will have to send 44,000 home over the next three and a half months to meet the deadline. Right now, it is still possible to move that many troops - but just barely. Any further delay in the drawdown will cause him to miss the deadline." Peter Kenyon reports on the drawdown for NPR's Morning Edition here.

Iraqi journalist Sardasht Osman was kidnapped from his college campus and murdered. His corpse was discovered last Thursday. Demonstrations have been held to protest the murder and Mihemed Eli Zalla (Hawler Tribune) reports that protests were staged yesterday as well in Sulaimania with demonstrators chanting, "We all are other Sardashts. We are not afraid of dath. Dr. Kamal Kirkuki, who killed Sardasht!" Kamal Kirkuki is the Speaker of the Krudistan Parliament. Yahya Barzani (AP) adds, "There have been nearly a dozen demonstrations over the past week in Iraq's Kurdish autonomous region calling for his killers to be brought to justice." Ranj Alaaldin (Guardian) notes, "Osman, writing anonymously but later revealing his identity, had been critical of the authorities and the patronage and corruption that plague Kurdistan. He pushed the boundaries of freedom in the region by publishing a number of inflammatory articles, insulting senior officials of the ruling Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) and the Kurdistan Democratic party (KDP); and crossed the red line of local taboo by writing of his desire to marry President Massoud Barzani's daughter: a no-go area for any sane Kurd." AFP reports protests continued today and quotes Hawlati editor Kamal Rauf stating, "We are continuing to demonstrate to demand an inquiry to discover the murderers."